


Therapy

by TheMuchTooMerryMaiden



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Angst, Gen, Miserable, Post Reichenbach, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-03
Updated: 2012-04-21
Packaged: 2017-11-02 23:45:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/374696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMuchTooMerryMaiden/pseuds/TheMuchTooMerryMaiden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of John's therapy sessions after 'The Reichenbach Fall'</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“How have you been, John?” 

To be honest it always struck John as a deeply stupid question, just how many of Ella’s clients he wondered came to see her when they were fine, when everything was tickety-boo? Without further thought he gave his stock answer,

“Fine, you?”

She smiled, a brief fugitive thing, before she made a note on the pad that was on her knee. John had long since stopped reading the notes; he found it hard to care these days. He glanced around the room and remembered he used to be irritated by the planned, forced calm of the room, the long windows with their views out to the tasteful garden, bringing in calming natural light; he’d hated it back before, now he could barely be bothered to even notice it.

“I’m fine, John. Have you come in for anything in particular?”

A thousand answers clamoured in John’s head becoming white noise and then a single chord,

“Just because he’s not here anymore.”

“That isn’t going to change, John. I’m sorry.”

“I know it won’t,” John paused and the pause elongated while Ella waited for him to continue, “but somehow I’m still waiting.”

“Do you think that’s healthy?”

Always a bloody question, always bloody neutral, always careful not to judge,

“I don’t know, but I’ll be waiting, just ... because ...”


	2. Chapter 2

“You’re a doctor, John, you know about the five stages? This is classic denial, can you see that?”

Of course I can, John thought, I can see that it seems that way to you, but it’s not denial, it’s hope,

“I suppose so,” he replied even though he didn’t. John noted an infinitesimal look of disbelief and almost irritation on her face, gone before he could even be completely sure that he’d seen it. 

“How long has it been, John?”

Do you want it to the minute, or just to the hour, he wondered before replying,

“Seven and a half months,”

“That’s a long time to be stuck in ‘denial’, John.”

“It’s a long time to be without him.”

Ella cleared her throat and looked down at the pad still perched on her knee as it always was. She cleared her throat again and John knew that she was having trouble framing what she wanted to say, knew what she was going to say,

“Sherlock’s dead, John, you know that.”

“Yes,” he swallowed before he continued, remembering the first time he’d said it out loud, sat in this same chair, just after, “I know that, I saw him, I checked his pulse,” his voice faltered and he rubbed his face before straightening up in his chair, “I checked his breathing, but...”


	3. Chapter 3

“But what, John?” Ella asked and John could hear the ‘humouring’ tone of her voice. Still she already thought he was a nutter, what the hell,

“But I know he’s still out there.” He said it as a flat statement, a truth so obvious that it needed no particular emphasis. After he spoke John watched Ella, saw the minute shift she made in how she was sitting, observed her discomfort and wondered if he’d even have noticed it before he’d met Sherlock. She cleared her throat,

“I think many people … sense or … believe … that something of their loved ones continues after death,”

John interrupted,

“No, it’s not that, I don’t believe in any kind of ‘after-life’, Afghanistan saw to that, he’s still out there, I don’t know what he’s doing, I don’t know why he has to do it on his own, but he’s out there.” John was aware of his streaming eyes it was just one more thing that wasn’t relevant. So he was crying, what did that matter?

“If you’re so sure that Sherlock is still alive why are you so upset, John? Why are you coming to see me?”

“Because he must need me to. He must need me to be mourning, or he wouldn’t have left me here without him, he wouldn’t do this to us both.


	4. Chapter 4

“So if you’re sure he’s alive, why are you here?” she asked.

John found himself irrationally pleased to hear a slight note of irritation in her voice,

“I’m here because I have to go through the motions, I have to be convincing, he must need that or he would have told me what was going on.” John smiled at her faintly, trying to gauge her reaction. She cleared her throat,

“John, you know this isn’t real, Sherlock really is dead, anything else is wish fulfilment.”

He smiled back at her,

“Do you think he was a fake?” 

“I know you don’t, but the evidence seems overwhelming. Why do you believe in him?”

“Because if he was a fake he would have made more of an attempt to be ‘normal’ he wouldn’t have called attention to how untypical he was, as I said to him, ‘Nobody could fake being such an annoying dick all the time’, if he was pretending he would have pretended to be more normal.” John sat up straighter and continued, “Anyway, he must need me to really behave as if he’s gone, so here I am.”

“I’m not sure that I can really help you any more, John, if you won’t face reality...”

Once he’d left she flipped her Rolodex round to the Ms and phoned her boss.


End file.
